Trailer for “Boy! What a Girl!”, a 1947 film made primarily for African American audiences by Herald Pictures. The one hour long film, which was originally planned to be the first in a series of twelve all Black cast films, was directed by Arthur H. Leonard and stars vaudeville comedian Tim Moore (later to become famous as the “Kingfish” from Amos n’ Andy), with guest appearances by Deek Watson and His Brown Dots, Slam Stewart, ‘Big’ Sid Catlett and his band, Ann Cornell and the International Jitterbugs, and Gene Krupa (the only Anglo cast member). The film included the song “Satchel Mouth Baby” performed by pianist Mary Lou Williams and Betti Mays singing “Crazy Riffin’” by Walter Gil Fuller. The fairly thin plot of the movie centered around two producers, who are trying to get financial backing for their musical show. Ironically, the cost “Boy” — which press materials indicated was four times the normal budget for a race film — might have almost sunk Herald Pictures. The company apparently released a 1948 film called “Miracle in Harlem” and 1947’s “Sepia Cinderella” before disappearing off the face of the earth.

Note: after Tim Moore became well known for his role on Amos ‘n Andy, “Boy What a Girl” was re-released with the new tagline “‘Kingfish’ of Comedy. Queen of the Show.”

We encourage viewers to add comments and, especially, to provide additional information about our videos by adding a comment! See something interesting? Tell people what it is and what they can see by writing something for example: “01:00:12:00 — President Roosevelt is seen meeting with Winston Churchill at the Quebec Conference.”

This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com